itch.io

Daily Grapple is out. It's a browser speedrun where everyone in the world

gets the same procedurally generated grappling course for the current UTC

date — swing, sling and reel your way to the flag and post your time.

No accounts, no installs. Open it, play, compare, retry.

What's in it:

- One shared map per day, generated from the date

- Three hook types that behave differently: swing, sling (launches you on

  release), reel (winds you in)

- Instant restarts — R resets the run the moment you press it

- Daily and weekly leaderboards, monthly seasons, personal records

- Replay ghosts, plus live ghosts of whoever else is playing right now

- Private challenge rooms and share links

- Phones and tablets supported, English and Spanish

The course is generated by building a guaranteed chain of reachable hooks

from start to finish first, then decorating around it with platforms,

saws, spikes and updrafts — so every day's map is always completable, but

never the same shape.

Play: https://makisgames.itch.io/dailygrapple or https://dailygrapple.io

Tell me what today's map did to you.

9/9/2026 Update:

I spent some time polishing the game and fixing the track drawing mechanic.

I fixed the loadout grid alignment with the tray. This wasn't an actual error, the starter loadout was positioned in the center and it made it look a bit weird. Now it is positioned next to the tray.

The upgrades are now also positioned left-to-right on the tray. It looks better in my opinion.

Structures

Structures are a way to make the game harder since they block you from drawing over them.
They force you to go around them, making you spend more ink.

I went with a similar approach to the game Freeways where structures are just squares with different sprites, serving different purposes besides blocking you.

I added a house sprite which has 2 different sizes, 28x28 for the smaller one and 60x60 for the bigger one.

Each map is randomly generated and there is a difficulty logic that tries to place more structures as you progress on the game.

There are other structures that I don't have the sprites for at the moment and I also plan to add more.
And I also plan to make them useful, for example to pass over a clutter of houses you use a different kind of track or maybe they have someone waiting to be picked up inside.

I will leave this system for later and I'll focus more on finishing the sprites for the other 2 structures I currently have.

Track Drawing

I reworked the drawing logic completely.
I was using splines because at first my idea was to make the tracks drawing similar to Freeways, where you can freely draw around like a canvas.

Then I added the dotted background and I thought it might be a good idea to only be able to draw using those dots as the path, so the player can actually run out of space (probably never going to happen but it is possible)

I removed the spline logic and I changed it to only use the dots that you select while dragging the mouse to generate the track. 

I'm still working on gameplay mechanics, win condition, earn more money, more mechanics in general.
Hopefully I can have a working version soon so you can play it.

9/7/2026 Update: I spent some these last 2 days working on the upgrades and the loadout system.

My original idea was that the size of the loadout was set for each of the different contracts, this way you would get more space for more upgrades the harder the game gets. But while testing this I realized that it would be nice to turn this into another mechanic, to make the player choose between loadout space or a new upgrade. 

This means I'll probably spend more time balancing the game later on but I think it's worth it.

The game now starts with a 4x2 loadout but I will probably change this later to only give enough space to the player to only fit the starting upgrades. That means a starting loadout size of 2x1. This way on the second map the player is already choosing and the mechanic makes sense.

I added the different options for expanding the loadout in the shop.

It also now shows the amount of upgrades you own (survey crew x2 on the picture)

I made the sprites for the upgrades that I currently have. They are not great but I am also not a great artist.

I'll focus on the actual gameplay moving forward, most of the systems aren't connected, there is no win condition or way to generate more money.

I've started working on a new game called Trains, Trucks & Tractors.

The basic idea is to take the idea of transportation/road-building games and wrap it inside something closer to a roguelike/incremental game.

You build roads by drawing them directly on a map, connecting the places that need to be connected.  Maps are randomly generated each run and instead of trying to build a permament city you have to achieve certain goals on each one of them.

Setup

A run has 8 different contracts.

Before each contract you get a preview of the next map and you can prepare a loadout of upgrades. In this same screen you can see the goals for the map you are about to play and your statistics (W.I.P)

Once you are ready, you enter the map, start connecting routes and working towards achieving the goals.

The game has three transportation types:

• Trains
• Trucks
• Tractors

I'm still working on the design for these, what each one does, etc. For now each of these have their own road type (trains use rail tracks, trucks roads and tractors dirt roads)

Runs

My main focus for this game will be on the game loop, what can I achieve with the road-building mechanic and how far I can go by mixing it with other genres such as roguelike, those are my main questions.

I'm looking at games like Balatro, Isaac, Freeways where you can understand the loop pretty but that doesn't mean the game itself is simple, short or bad. The rules around the main mechanic is what makes these games so good.

Upgrades

I am also still thinking about how upgrades affect the game.

At the moment you have to choose which upgrades you want to use on the next map because they occupy a physical space in the loadout. Better upgrades occupy more space.

This is another big part of the game, replayability. In my honest opinion a good roguelike is about how many times I can play the same map differently (I'm not sure that makes sense)

Art

The art style is inspired by Lucas Pope's games. He is so good at keeping things simple but still looking great. I am sticking to just 3 colours for the entire palette with a 1-bit style.

I'm not an artist and I don't want to focus on it too much for this game. I feel like everytime I want to start a new project I worry too much about how it will look, how to make it attractive and I forget that the game has to be fun to play.

Stack

I spent some time messing around with different frameworks for this game and I landed on Haxe with HaxeFlixel.

I wrote DUMMS! entirely in Odin with Sokol and I think this is the best choice if you enjoy making games, but I wanted something different. I also tried JAI for the 100th time and again it reminded too much to Odin, which isn't bad at all but as I said above, I wanted something different. I spent some time with LOVE2D and I really enjoyed how easy it is to take what I have in my head and put it into a game. I didn't stick with it because I stumbled across Haxe.

Haxe solves a few problems (and introduces a few new ones) that I didn't want to put up with. Mostly building for different platforms.

I spent some time refactoring code for DUMMS! to build it for web, linux, windows, mac, etc. I created a script for LOVE2D to build games for the web.

In Haxe I just run a different command and that's it, it just works. 

Conclussion

Most of the basic mechanics are working, drawing roads, upgrades, procedural generation.

There is no playable version at the moment but my goal is to have a working version soon and hopefully get some feedback on it.

I wanted to do this devlog to see how my idea sounds to other people. Any kind of feedback or comments is welcome.

Hey everyone, I'm already working with someone for this project, thanks a lot for everyone who replied, I really appreciate it

I sent you a discord friend request!

Hey! 
I'm looking for a 2D pixel artist to work with me on the art for my game as a whole (not just individual sprites)

The game is already well into development, it has a solid base and I'm mostly adding features at the moment. I can share screenshots/videos and more details if you're interested.

I don't have a big upfront budget, I can offer $50 plus Rev-Share (I'm thinking up to 40%, depending on how involved you want to be with the project)

I have already published a game on Steam called DUMMS! where I tried making the art myself and that obviously wasn't a great idea.
I'll also be covering the publishing costs myself.

Hey!
I would like to buy the asset pack but I can't use paypal on my country.

Is there another way to get access to it?
Thanks in advance!

Thanks so much for the comment! Yeah, the movement is designed to be exactly like that and the power ups are completely random, so you were a little unlucky haha.

Really fun game, I loved the concept and the art!

This concept is AMAZING!
It's such a simple idea yet so fun.
It would look so much better with some particles effects when destroying the ships.

I really like the concept! I think it would be nice for it to be more frantic, but it is a really cool idea.
I got killed just after starting because a kite spawned in the same place as the UFO, but besides that really good submission!

Hey! I did the UI and the character/bow. Then the Dummy and Background are from an itch pack I found.
I think the UI still needs some work, but it is serving it's purpose for now! 

Buenas! Agregame a discord y hablamos a ver que podriamos hacer! yongteureum